


Beltane (or: Fertility and Rejuvenation)

by nerdyydragon



Series: What Lurks in Shadow [6]
Category: Kingsman (2014), Kingsman (2015), Kingsman (Movies)
Genre: God ! Eggsy, M/M, Witch Harry, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-11-03 21:06:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10975338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdyydragon/pseuds/nerdyydragon
Summary: Beltane - historically the night before the first of May and extending through well into the next evening - is a time of celebration, when social roles are cast off and the exaltation of the returning sun god's influence on growth and fertility is (ahem) performed.





	Beltane (or: Fertility and Rejuvenation)

Harry blinked slowly as his eyes took in the light filtering through the trees, dappling here and there with leaves from the canopy, casting everything in a soft glow that seemed otherworldly.  _ Wasn’t that the point of last night? To be otherworldly? _ A voice at the back of his head hissed, sounding suspiciously like one of his schoolmates. 

Trying to move his shoulder, Harry was greeted only with a sharp twinge in his back and an ache though his whole body, his only distinct memory from the night before. Next to him, someone - likely the source of heat he was beginning to notice stretching along his left side - groaned.  _ Not the only distinct memory, then _ .

Turning his head slightly, Harry managed a glance to his left.

He wished, for all he had in him, that he hadn’t been able to see what was there.

The man lying next to him in the thick grass was by far the most beautiful he had ever seen, and while Harry wanted nothing more in that moment than to reach over and brush a stray bloom from where it was leaning against his face, the more Harry studied him the more he could see his likeness in old grimoires, and what he had pieced together from stories. This was no ordinary man, and Harry’s life was about to become  _ very _ complicated.

Moving carefully, Harry tried to extract himself from the comfortable warmth radiating into his side, his entire body tense as an arm was tossed across his chest and a thigh wrapped around his own. Counting the freckles that dotted the forearm all the way up to the other man’s shoulder, Harry tried to calm his racing heart. It wasn’t that he had  _ regrets _ from the night before, that wasn’t what the night had been about, but if there had been anyone who could have been chosen at random by the very god they were to be worshiping come dawn,  _ of course _ it would be him, notorious for bad circumstance as he was.

_ He’s still asleep _ , Harry thought to himself.  _ Nothing to worry about _ . The arm around his chest tightened, and the man let out a satisfied groan.  _ He’s still asleep _ .

“C’n  _ hear _ you pan’kin’,” slurred a voice, and Harry cursed himself. Looking down, he was met with a pair of the most confusing eyes he had ever seen, dancing above a sea of freckles and a laughing grin. “Whereabouts you think you’re gonna go, gorgeous?” Harry felt his magic curl up inside his chest at something in that voice, congregate around where the hand on his ribs was drawing absent patterns, feather-light and teasing.

“Nowhere, nowhere at all,” came out of his mouth, but the words sounded pained and hollow. The man’s smile dropped. The sun’s rays shone a little harsher through the trees. Harry was suddenly, painfully, entirely aware that he was stark naked in the middle of a forest, at the mercy of a volatile sun god. He tried for a smile, choosing his next words carefully. “But don’t you have a celebration to be getting to? A wedding feast?”

That had, in fact, been the point of last night, if his hazy memory was anything to go by. Responsibilities and social norms were thrown off as everyone celebrated the return of the sun and the fertile planting season after a long winter, but what they hadn’t been counting on - what  _ Harry _ hadn’t been counting on - was the appearance of said young sun god. And thus Harry’s night had ended rather abruptly when a stranger had taken him by the hand and led him away from the bonfire and deeper into the forest to  _ make their own fun _ , as he had so eloquently put it. Except now Harry was putting more and more of the pieces together, stringing them up from what little he could pull out of his mead-addled brain, and what he was coming out with was far more serious than a simple night of debauchery in the spirit of the holiday.

The hand on his ribcage changed its patterns, and Harry could feel his magic pulse through him again, stronger than before.  _ You haven’t felt this much power since you were young, when it was too strong for you _ . The voice in his head didn’t sound like any of his friends any longer, but it didn’t quite sound like himself either.

“Isn’t that better?” The sun god was staring a metaphorical hole through the side of Harry’s face, grinning widely again.

“What did you do?” Harry tried to swallow around his tongue, around the overwhelming emotions he was feeling.

“How do you humans say it? I changed your battery.” There was a smile in his voice, and Harry knew that whatever he had  _ really _ done was worth far more than a simple thank you. The hand slid lower, thumb brushing over the jutting hip bone that Harry couldn’t quite think of as his own at the moment. “Wasn’t that nice of me?” Harry nodded. “That’s all I get? Even after last night?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” The words felt like sand in his mouth, halting after each word and the next a new trial. His vision of the treetops was blocked by his partner rolling over and above him, still grinning. The hand on his hip slipped into the grass, and the other began tracing patterns onto his chest and stomach. When Harry looked down, he could see bright colours pulled from his skin. The god leaned down, and Harry tried not to focus on how his sun-warmed skin smelled like summer or how beautiful he was or anything that had happened last night, and his whole world began to narrow down to the magic thrumming in his chest and his breath mingling with heaven.

“Make me a  _ promise _ , Harry.” If he moved his head just enough he could have kissed the other man, but he wasn’t sure if he really wanted to. He decided he did.

“A year and a day.” The blue-grey-green of the god’s eyes - like the clouds of a summer storm - blinked, but he didn’t pull away.

“And if I don’t want to let you go once our time is up?” He seemed to shift closer, but he couldn’t have, because if he did then they would have been touching, and Harry could feel his chest rise and meet the ribs of the god who held his life in his hands.

“Then you’ll have to convince me to stay.” The last of the distance was closed, and Harry could have sworn his heart stopped for a moment. It didn’t taste like a kiss, it tasted like sunshine and summer heat and the smell of flowers in bloom, and Harry knew that he wasn’t going to need much convincing.

**Author's Note:**

> So things are going to get a little up in the air for a while because of uni, but I promise I have some good stuff on the way for you guys ;)


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